From Guardian: Commodities and oil will offer huge returns when global inflation takes off, fund of funds Caliburn Capital says, but it advised investors to avoid length in them this year while deflationary pressures dominate.

Caliburn Chief Investment Officer Chris Bouckley was pessimistic over the outlook for the world economy, seeing it contracting this year and not hitting bottom until mid-2010…..Full Article: Source

From Forbes: Oil, copper, corn and soybean prices should rise in the second quarter, recovering further from recession, but gold, natural gas, nickel and wheat may ease due to weaker supply/demand fundamentals.

Commodities as a whole fared better in the first three months of 2009 than the last two quarters of 2008, and analysts predicted continued price swings in coming months as the asset class responds to attempts to fix the global economy…..Full Article: Source

From Zawya.com: Sovereign wealth funds from the Middle East, and Japanese and Korean companies are seeking mining acquisitions and investments after asset values dropped, competing with Chinese companies, UBS said.

“This is the time to do that because asset values are low,” Paul Knight, managing director and joint global head of metals and mining with UBS, said today. “The Koreans are looking at acquisitions, and the Japanese to some extent.”….Full Article: Source

From Businessday.co.za: Mining group Xstrata on Friday said cutbacks in mineral production in response to the global recession could come back to haunt buyers as prices rise significantly due to shortages once demand recovers in response to a raft of stimulus measures implemented to deal with the global recession.

Commodity prices have plummeted due to flat demand as major consuming countries grapple with the worst global recession in more than six decades…..Full Article: Source

From Reuters: Oil prices could reach $75 per barrel in 2009 despite a the economic crisis, OPEC president Angola said on Monday, adding that compliance by the 12-member group with the agreed cuts remained at around 80 percent.

Jose Botelho de Vasconcelos, who is also Angolan oil minister, said he hoped the upcoming G20 meeting will help stimulate the world economy and contribute to growing demand for oil and higher oil prices…..Full Article: Source

From Commodities-now.com: The collapse in oil prices could end up cutting the growth in future oil supply in half from what would have been anticipated during the high price period, according to a new study from Cambridge Energy Research Associates (CERA), an IHS Inc.company.

The Long Aftershock concludes that about 7.6 million barrels per day (mbd) out of total potential future net growth of 14.5 mbd from 2009 to 2014 are “at risk.”….Full Article: Source

From AFP: Qatar’s Energy Minister Abdullah al-Attiya said on Monday that the latest price of oil is “reasonable” given the ongoing global economic downturn.

“Fifty (dollars a barrel) is a reasonable price for 2009, considering the global economic crisis,” Attiya told reporters on the sidelines of a two-day energy forum in Kuwait City…..Full Article: Source

From Ogj.com: Seaborne oil exports from the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, except Angola and Ecuador, will decline by 770,000 b/d in the 4 weeks to Apr. 11, according to shipping analyst Oil Movements (OM).

Exports will average 22.23 million b/d, down from 23.00 million b/d in the 4 weeks to Mar. 14, OM said in an estimate that is lower than last week’s, which itself represented a 5 1/2-year low of 22.41 million b/d…..Full Article: Source

From WSJ: Credit Suisse (CS) has hired Jonathan Grundy from Merrill Lynch to head up its EMEA Energy business, according to an internal memo seen Monday by Dow Jones Newswires.

Grundy, who starts at Credit Suisse’s London office in July, was most recently Global Head of Energy & Power Investment Banking at Merrill Lynch as well as serving on the bank’s global investment banking executive committee…..Full Article: Source

From Commodities-now.com: It had been termed the Brave New World — the one where electricity restructuring would revolutionize business models, technology development and consumer behaviors. But it has yet to happen. With the newfound emphasis on climate change, however, the energy sector may be jolted in ways that advocates of deregulation had only dreamed.

It centers on controlling energy use, which in turn limits emissions, helps preserve the environment and increases grid reliability. It will take an holistic approach…..Full Article: Source

From Ens-newswire.com: President Barack Obama has reversed the U.S. position on global climate change negotiations from the skepticism, delays and obstructive strategies of the previous administration to a new cooperative policy based on both science and practicality.

“My team and I came here determined to make up for lost time. America is now once again strongly committed to developing a global response to climate change,” the President’s Special Envoy for Climate Change Todd Stern told journalists at the opening of the UN-backed Bonn climate talks on Sunday…..Full Article: Source

From Mineweb.com: Emissions trading schemes and carbon trading are putting a heavy burden on energy costs as governments try to force reductions in carbon emissions - but are they justified? There are doubters out there.

While it seems that the “politics” of climate change may be settled, there is still much scientific debate over whether climate change is in fact caused by human activities, with the weight of scientific evidence tending to “unfrock” the climate “alarmists”…..Full Article: Source

From Economicnews.ca: Growing negative sentiment is causing investors to move out of commodity markets, which is also helping to drag down gold prices.

Gold prices are modestly weaker Monday afternoon, trading in the mid-$951 per ounce level. There was an increase in volatility early in the North American session. Prices dropped to session lows of $908.60 just ahead of the open…..Full Article: Source

From Mineweb.com: RBC Capital Markets forecasts the gold price will continue to be volatile “offering an attractive buying opportunity for gold stocks on pullbacks into periods of weak demand in Q2/09 and early Q3/09.”

Meanwhile RBC is maintaining its average gold price forecasts of $850/oz for this year, $875/oz for 2010, and $900/oz long-term. Key catalysts for gold are expected to be seasonal demand trends; speculative and investment flows; emerging market flows and scrap gold sales; and U.S. dollar impact…..Full Article: Source

From Busrep.co.za: While the global motor industry is still in disarray, platinum is looking pretty good. Having troughed in October at just more than $770 (R7 422 at the current exchange rate) an ounce, the metal hit a high of $1 153 on Friday - a recovery of nearly 50 percent - before retreating to $1 131.

According to Bloomberg, Deutsche Bank ascribed the improvement to “relatively robust” jewellery demand, while Reuters quoted Citigroup linking it to expectations that the US government would provide aid to its car makers. The metal is used in catalytic converters, which reduce pollution from cars…..Full Article: Source

From Bloomberg: Copper prices fell by the most in almost six weeks after the government said U.S. banks and carmakers may need more taxpayer help, renewing concern that the global economic slump will slash demand for raw materials.

The Reuters/Jefferies CRB Index of 19 commodities slid to the lowest in more than a week after the government ousted General Motors Corp. Chief Executive Officer Rick Wagoner…..Full Article: Source

From Moneymanagement.com: The number of new managed funds launched over the next few years will be “greatly reduced”, as will their targeted “raise sizes”, according to Craig Northey, head of sales and relationship management at researcher Aegis.

“Between 2007-08 and 2008-09 we researched around 60 new funds each year, which is a lot, but we expect that number to fall away over the next two to three years,” he said…..Full Article: Source

From Forbes: The Norwegian crown weakened by 3 percent against the euro and dollar on Monday, hit by a drop in equity and oil prices and remarks from the central bank chief who said the currency is no safe haven, analysts said.

They said it also weakened on momentum from last week and slightly softer-than-forecast retail sales data for February…..Full Article: Source

From Bloomberg: The Monetary Authority of Singapore may devalue the city’s currency and allow it to drop 4 percent against the U.S. dollar by June 30 to aid exporters and lift the economy out of the worst recession since independence in 1965.

The central bank will shift the mid-point of the Singapore dollar trading band at a twice-yearly review in April, according to 15 of 17 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News…..Full Article: Source

From Business-standard.com: India’s largest commodity trading platform, the Multi-Commodity Exchange (MCX), is setting up a clearing corporation, a 100 per cent subsidiary, to look after the clearing of trading orders floated by members and clients.

From Reuters: The London Stock Exchange is in talks to buy a stake in new Indian stock exchange MCX-SX, the Business Standard reported on Monday.

The newspaper said a spokesman for the LSE would not comment on the discussions, but told the paper: “We have a strong commitment to the Indian market and feel certain that the country will continue to be at the centre of our international business.”….Full Article: Source

From Nazret.com: The Ethiopian commodity exchange (ECX) is devising a proposal for agriculture training centres to disseminate trading and exchange programs to coffee and green crop farmers.

Eleni Zaud Gebre Medhin (PHD) told Capital the institutions have already promised to include details of ECX’s program and how it is working in their curriculum for the diploma program…..Full Article: Source

From Commodityonline.com: As I went inside the chamber of Mr. Kailash Chandra Shahra, the chief of Ruchi Soya Industries Limited, he asked me what business I was in. I said I am into the business of writing. He immediately lifted his face, with wrinkles visibly shaking and said, “I do not interact with journalists anymore.”

I happened to arrive early in Indore by an ATR operated by Jet Airways and just minutes before I took off from Ahmedabad, another ATR zoomed past us for the same destination – operated by King Fisher Airlines…..Full Article: Source

From Mondovisione.com: Tokyo Commodity Exchange, Inc, Japan’s largest and Asia’s prominent commodity exchange, and Nikkei Inc. (Nikkei), Japan’s most influential economic daily newspaper, announced today that they have agreed to jointly manage the new “Nikkei-TOCOM Commodity Index”.

As a result of this agreement, the TOCOM Index which has been publicized by TOCOM since July 2006 will change its name to the “Nikkei-TOCOM Commodity Index” as of the April 1, 2009 calculation…..Full Article: Source

From Commodities-now.com: The Dubai Tea Trading Centre (DTTC), a division of the Dubai Multi Commodities Centre (DMCC), unveiled today its new centralised tea storage, blending and value addition services as part of its expansion plans to accommodate the growing activities of the centre.

From Bloomberg: Wheat rebounded from the lowest price in almost four weeks on speculation that the amount of spring wheat planted in the U.S. northern Great Plains will drop as excessive snow and rain flooded fields.

As much as six times normal precipitation has fallen in parts of North Dakota and Minnesota, the largest U.S. spring- wheat producers, in the past week, National Weather Service data show…..Full Article: Source

From Hardassetsinvestor.com: There are two separate crops of wheat in the news right now. There is the winter wheat that was sown last fall and is beginning to sprout and grow.

The areas where this wheat is growing (primarily in the U.S. southern plains) have actually welcomed the rain - given the stage of the growth cycle, the rain that part of the country has experienced is helpful to the crop…..Full Article: Source

From Jutiagroup.com: Commodities are direct beneficiaries of inflation. Two weeks ago, Bernanke announced a plan to inflate the U.S. money supply by over a trillion dollars. Commodities celebrated. Oil and copper both broke out to new four-month highs.

The Swiss, British, and Japanese governments are also pursuing inflationary policies. As the world’s most important money issuers destroy their currencies, commodities could explode…..Full Article: Source